Wikia Search Upgrades Get Closer

Barence writes "Wikia Search has been revamped with a wealth of editing tools, to build on its early promise of being a more open search engine. The firm behind Wikipedia has introduced a wealth of editorial tools allowing users to directly edit and annotate results with text, images and links, as well as spotlight specific searches or even delete a site from the search results, a change which affects everyone who conducts that search in the future." Update: 06/04 17:32 GMT by T : Jimmy Wales wrote to point out that despite his role in founding Wikipedia, Wikia is a completely separate company.

Comments

Closer to What Exactly?

[eldavojohn]

Wikia Search Upgrades Get Closer Closer to?

Wikia Search moves closer to open ideal Oh, an "open ideal?" Is that a problem? I thought that was all Wikia's Search had going for it right now.

Don't get me wrong, that's about all Wikipedia had going for it at one time. That and a meager couple thousand pages.

But I think Wales' search project should aim a little higher at this point in time ... the improved tools are great and I don't doubt this is the openest search engine out there ... but shouldn't we all be a little more concerned about how well it works?

Also, maybe the reward system should be a little more tangible, like Wikipedia's? I mean, people get a kick out of seeing something they write benefiting everyone in the world. I personally don't get a kick out of knowing that if someone searches for 'Lola by The Kinks' it now comes up with more accurate results. I question the rewards although, to be fair, I also questioned the rewards of Wikipedia.

It shall be interesting to see whether or not this takes off. I encourage Wales to keep trying because even if this doesn't work, it certainly hasn't cost me anything. I wish him and his staff the best of luck!

Problems?

[Archangel Michael]

as well as spotlight specific searches or even delete a site from the search results, a change which affects everyone who conducts that search in the future." Anyone else see anything wrong with this?

I want my results to be as agnostic as humanly possible, which means keep human hands out of my results.

The problem with this type of search is that those with agendas will control the results. While I may like the agenda or support it, I don't want to limit what I see to just my POV. There are too many people who can't think beyond their own little world.

I don't want Scientologists skewing results. I don't want Bush Bashers skewing the results anymore than Obama Haters. I don't want KKK results being skewed up or down because of an agenda (or two).

I want to see Huffington Posts along with Michael Savage. The moment someone starts monkeying the results, the agnostic nature of searches goes away, and the search will become useless to me.

Re:Problems?

[FooAtWFU]

as well as spotlight specific searches or even delete a site from the search results, a change which affects everyone who conducts that search in the future." Anyone else see anything wrong with this? I want my results to be as agnostic as humanly possible, which means keep human hands out of my results.

Good. Have fun searching spam.

Seriously, even Google's PageRank stuff relies on "human hands" placing links to documents on web pages.

Re:Problems?

[Archangel Michael]

I'm pretty sure you don't know how Page Rank works.

From Wikipedia .....

PageRank is a link analysis algorithm that assigns a numerical weighting to each element of a hyperlinked set of documents The results are based on an algorithm, not human manipulation. While PageRank isn't perfect, it is still about as good as anything else out there.

Re:Problems?

[pablomme]

The results are based on an algorithm, not human manipulation. The GP's point is that the data the algorithm uses is supplied by humans (those who write the webpages that link to other webpages).

Re:"Open"

[nahdude812]

Except that we know many admins on Wikipedia have repeatedly abused their position to advance a point of view on a topic - sometimes even for a topic they have a vested personal interest in - and suppress an opposing view.

Who's to say that when an admin of Wikia Search also owns one or more sites in a given category, they won't use their power to repeatedly squash their competitor sites? And that when it comes up for review, their you-scratch-my-back-and-I'll-scratch-yours admin friends won't be there to defend them?

Jimbo needs to do a lot of work in regard to increasing visibility of administrative process, and addressing administrative abuse (his typical response has been to blindly defend his admins).

If he doesn't, abuse will become a lot more rampant, a lot more widespread, and a lot more subtle since now we're talking about something which can directly affect profits of a company and those of its competitors.